


Brave New World

by TenSpencerRiedPlease



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, BAMF Nebula (Marvel), Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Nebula (Marvel) Angst, Parent Tony Stark, Precious Peter Parker, Protective Tony Stark, Thanos is a big ass prick, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Trans Peter Parker
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-27
Updated: 2018-08-27
Packaged: 2019-07-03 05:28:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15812346
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TenSpencerRiedPlease/pseuds/TenSpencerRiedPlease
Summary: There are a lot of people who ask Tony how he knew and he has no real answer for it. Maybe its because he was a rich kid who was abused too- no one would have ever guessed it looking at him and no one would have ever guessed it looking at Nebula either. It could have been instinct, the scientific basis for it suggests instincts are actually pretty accurate, but that doesn’t feel right either. Or, he guesses, it could have been some kind of paternal instinct he gained after he ended up with Harley and Peter. That doesn’t seem right either but he does know that it hadn’t taken long for him to determine that Nebula needed some kind of help.





	Brave New World

**Author's Note:**

> This started out as a tumblr prompt that is as follows: For the prompt/pairing thing: Tony attempting to adopt Nebula away from Thanos. (Not romantic Tony and Nebula, more like awkward bonding?).
> 
> It grew into this.
> 
> Warnings for referenced child abuse and Thanos- dude is a real piece of shit.

There are a lot of people who ask Tony how he knew and he has no real answer for it. Maybe its because he was a rich kid who was abused too- no one would have ever guessed it looking at him and no one would have ever guessed it looking at Nebula either. It could have been instinct, the scientific basis for it suggests instincts are actually pretty accurate, but that doesn’t feel right either. Or, he guesses, it could have been some kind of paternal instinct he gained after he ended up with Harley and Peter. That doesn’t seem right either but he does know that it hadn’t taken long for him to determine that Nebula needed some kind of help.

He’d been helping out around the shelter- another pet project he picked up after handing Pepper the company. The intent behind it was to spend more time with the kids but they’re both teens and they’re self sufficient not to mention in the stage of life where they start to expand and explore. They had more of an interest in their friends and social life and Tony had been a little stung by it, but ultimately they needed the space so he gave it to them. Instead he started filling his time with charity work, which Harley had joked made him a lot like his mom not that he made that connection until Harley did. For the first time maybe ever Tony had been compared to the parent he actually cared about more and it’d been touching.

That’d been the high he was riding when he was at the shelter and he noticed the bald, well-dressed teen across the road. The first time he didn’t pay much attention to her. When she started showing up regularly though, but never actually going in, he started to wonder. And when she walked up to him one day only to seemingly change her mind as she got too close he reached out. “You’re going to keep finding yourself here until you get what you’re looking for,” he had told her, causing her to pause for a moment.

“I don’t know what I’m looking for,” she’d told him in a harsh, unforgiving tone that didn’t sound like it came out of a child’s mouth. Tony supposes he can credit  _that_  as the moment he knew for sure that something was going on. He’d had his suspicions before but thanks to Peter and Harley he knows what the average well adjusted fifteen year old sounds like and Nebula reminded him more of himself at that age that Harley, Peter, or any of their friends. But in that moment Nebula had chosen to walk away and Tony regrets letting her do that now.

The next time he had run into her she’d been across the road again, looking over at the shelter like normal so Tony had walked over. She kept showing up, something about the place was obviously drawing and if Tony was correct its because she needed the help the shelter could offer, but knew no one in it would offer it to someone that looked like her. He knew the feeling all too well- his wealth has brought him a good many things in life, more than most could ever even ask for and for that he was grateful, but it did build him into a prison of privilege that seemed to negate any possibility of being a victim of anything. Why people come to that conclusion he understands, financial struggles aren’t exactly a walk in the park or so he’s heard, but there comes a point where even the richest can’t buy safety if the person that’s hurting them holds more power and wealth than they do.

Howard had been that for him- Tony couldn’t escape his house because his father would just pay someone to bring him back. He couldn’t call the cops because Howard would pay them off. He couldn’t go to the press, Howard could pay them off too. That money became a trap he was stuck in until the man died and even now people question his story. So he knew maybe better than most that looking wealthy didn’t mean a person was okay and he had been certain Nebula wasn’t okay.

“Have you figured out what you’re looking for?” he asked. Nebula didn’t answer for a long time before she had let out a long sigh.

“I don’t think you have what I’m looking for,” she’d murmured.

He hadn’t been so sure so he’d grinned and said, “try me.”

That, he supposes, is how he’d ended up slowly bonding with Nebula. They spent a lot of time together outside that shelter talking about mostly things that didn’t matter like movies or whatever she was reading at the time. She likes sci-fi mostly, and dystopian fiction. She has the same taste in movies as she does in books so Tony had started bringing book and movie recommendations from Harley and Peter that she takes him up on looking into, too. Turns out she agrees with Peter that Star Trek is better than Star Wars, not that he’d ever tell Harley or Ned he thinks that, and her favorite book is Brave New World for what Tony thinks are disturbing reasons. But then at her age he’d agree with her analysis too so he leaves it.

It takes time to get to the actual meat of the problem, what Tony had been certain was abuse- but she does eventually tell him. And when he believes her she tells him more, and from there he doesn’t have a choice. There comes a point when you can’t in good conscience tell someone to go back to a home that better resembles a particularly nasty prison so he and Nebula made their plans, which led to her living at least temporarily with him. The boys, at least, were interested in having someone new around not that Nebula had been pleased about it. He’s pretty sure the way they all interact is pretty much the same way two puppies would interact with an old, grumpy cat would deal with each other and honestly its hilarious to watch.

She’s there for a week before the other shoe drops and its Pepper shrieking at him over the phone that alerts him to the problem. “ _Kidnapped_!” she yells at him. “You put that child back right  _now_  Tony, people are accusing you of a lot worse things than that!” Tony jumps because he had been  _sleeping_ , thanks, but drags himself into a sitting position.

“Relax Pepper, I didn’t kidnap anyone the hell are you talking about?” he mumbles, trying to remember what kids he had to nap. A regular nap sounds a lot more appealing to him than a kidnap at the moment.

“The girl, Tony. Jesus, how many more kids do you even have in that penthouse?” she asks and Tony clues in.

“Shit, okay, Pepper this is serious I’m going to need you to come over,” he tells her.

“No shit this is serious, you can’t kidnap people, Tony,” Pepper tells him in a tone that’s scolding, which would almost be funny if not for the situation.

“I didn’t kidnap anyone, come over here and I’ll explain. I’m surprised it took this long to get some kind of retaliation,” he says. Pepper, thankfully, agrees, and then he calls Christine. She’s more than delighted to hear from him given the current smear campaign currently happening in the media at the moment and he tells her to come over too. He’s offered her plenty of money to print what he wants out there and she’s never taken a bribe so he knows she’ll print whatever the truth is. She also doesn’t care if her opinion is popular or not- both things are a plus right now because when Tony pulls up the news for the morning Pepper hadn’t been kidding when she said kidnapping is probably the most proper thing he’s been accused of this morning.

When he makes his way to the kitchen nursing a low grade headache Harley and Peter are already awake looking confused and a little ashen. They obviously know the various accusations tossed Tony’s way aren’t true, but that probably doesn’t make them feel better. He sighs, “alright kids, I’ll be blunt. Nebula’s father, of you can even call him that, is a pretty shit person and he isn’t about to let go easily. It’ll mean a lot of bad publicity for me but that’s fine, its nothing I’ve never dealt with before,” he says. God knows he should have taken a half a second to listen to all the bad press in his Merchant of Death days, might have saved Christine the trouble of digging up evidence of Stane’s terrorism.

Harley frowns and so does Peter but Harley is the one who chooses to voice his concerns. “How come you have to be the one to deal with it?” he asks and that hurts, but Harley couldn’t possibly know why. Before his parents and sister died in that car accident he had a good life, and before Peter lost his aunt and uncle to gun violence he did too. Neither of them could possibly have a frame of reference for abuse and frankly Tony is happy for it, even if it means Harley asks stupid questions.

“Because when you know someone is being treated in a way that’s unacceptable you don’t let them go back to it, their abuser doesn’t get to win,” he tells them both. They look away, obviously having not considered that, and Tony goes to find Nebula, sure she’s heard the news too.

He finds her on the roof, sitting with a steaming cup of tea staring out at nothing in particular. She doesn’t look at him as he walks up, sitting across from her gingerly because he’s never had to do this before. “Nebula,” he starts softly but she shakes her head.

“I’m not worth all this, I’ll just go back,” she says harshly, jaw set and she’s still looking away.

Tony’s first instinct is to be angry, but he knows that won’t get him anywhere. “Nebula you aren’t going anywhere. I knew Thanos would try some bullshit like this when I took you in, the only thing that’s a surprise to me is that it took so long for this to happen,” he tells her. It occurs to him then that Thanos may have given Nebula just enough time to get comfortable before ruining it for her, reminding her of who, exactly, is in charge and that just pisses him off even more. “I have more money and power than he does- if he thinks he’s going to win a fight with me he’s wrong. And if you think I’ll give up on your you’re also wrong. I didn’t open a shelter for abused kids just to watch one go back to their abuser,” he says. Granted a lot of the kids that go through the shelter  _do_  end up going back to their abusers for reasons he doesn’t have control over, but when its possible he does his best to make sure they don’t need to do that. Most of the time it works.

Nebula stares at her tea for a long time before she talks. “I don’t know why you care so much,” she mumbles finally and Tony sighs.

“Because I used to be you, Nebula. I don’t care what this Thanos guy tries to throw at me, I’m fairly certain I’m more motivated than him and even if I wasn’t I know I’m more resourceful.” He has a lot of connections, most of which are fostered through good faith, and he’s not afraid to use them. He’s sure Thanos has connections too, but he’s just as sure he won’t be nearly as creative as Tony in his tactics. No one ever is and that’s a good reason why he’s more successful than most.

Nebula though, she looks shocked and belatedly Tony realizes he forgot to tell her about Howard. Which seems stupid now considering all that time he spent trying to gain her trust, it would have gone faster if she knew that, but it occurs to him that maybe finding out now is a better way to build a connection with her. He had reason to get her to open up before, and now he has more of a motivation to get rid of her, not build a bridge to her. That information probably feels a lot more genuine now than it would have in the beginning.

“Its how you knew,” she says and Tony shrugs.

“I don’t know how I knew, Nebs. But I am going to need to ask you to do something for me.”

He doesn’t want to ask Nebula to detail her abuse to anyone, but it will be necessary for both the media circus and what Tony knows is going to be a long court case. There will need to be evidence, a statement, whatever else, and now is as good a time as any to get all that in order. Nebula agrees easily enough and Tony wishes he could protect her from all the damage rehashing this will do but he’s not a miracle worker.

Pepper takes the news better than he thought she would, and Christine has always been a dog with a bone when it comes to the truth so he’d been expecting her particular brand of intense enthusiasm. Nebula takes an immediate dislike to Pepper for reasons Tony doesn’t understand but she at least likes Christine so she has less of a problem talking with her. Tony would have left her in peace with Christine partially because he has no desire to listen to her story again but also as a method or at least giving her some semblance of privacy in her own sob story but she stops him before he walks away, taking hold of his wrist and pulling him back without looking at him. A silent plea to stick around that he can’t not listen to so he sits, offering her a gently shoulder squeeze before he does.

Christine picks up on the action and what it means, Tony can see it in the way she looks at him, but she doesn’t say anything about it.

*

Nebula is mostly sure Tony’s plan, if you could even call it that, will fail until she reads the news three days after his supposed kidnapping her. He told her it would be best to let things bubble up naturally, or what looks natural to the general public, and let people see things that way. His explanation had been that, despite her accusations  _actually_  being true, if she told people at that exact moment it’ll sound like little more than a retaliation from a bratty teen. He’d looked uncomfortable when he said it, ashamed even, and that had been the only reason Nebula gave him the benefit of the doubt. She has no faith in people who decide that people her age are lying just because they’re her age. It wouldn’t be the first time its happened in her life, no one ever believed Gamora, but Tony insists that he knows how to deal with public smear campaigns.

She supposes he does, having been a celebrity his whole life, but she’d been skeptical until she read the paper this morning. She hadn’t been expecting to find Gamora’s accusations in it, or several other people’s stories about Thanos’ abuse. She hears footsteps and looks up to see who’s walking in mostly to see if she’ll have to leave. Peter and Harley aren’t particularly impressed with her at the moment- they’ll never tell her that, and they’d never show it in front of Tony, but she knows they both resent her for upheaving their lives. She isn’t sure she blames them for that resentment either.

But its Tony and when he sees the paper he smiles. “Turns out Thanos has made the news several times and a little digging from journalists does a lot to undermine his accusations. Not really the kidnapping one, but the rest is now up in the air. This is where most of the heavy lifting is going to come into play,” he says, sounding exhausted probably because technically speaking she  _had_  been kidnapped. She isn’t sure if that’s what it’ll look like legally, but she knows Tony probably has enough influence and wealth to make people look away from that if he wanted to. She’s seen Thanos pay people to look away from worse.

That might be something that would make her uncomfortable, the way Tony easily wields the social capital and power he has around, but its obvious he doesn’t have much interest in using it for nefarious reasons. She’s watched him closely for a long time, she knows his habits. He’s surprisingly generous- soft, even. It hadn’t been what she had been expecting out of Tony but she’s taking refuge in it now.

“How did you get Gamora to talk?” she asks, knowing her sister would have no interest in telling anyone about Thanos again.

Tony frowns, “who’s Gamora?” he asks and Nebula frowns.

“She’s in the news, didn’t you read it?” she asks. She would have thought he did with the way he’d been talking.

“No, well yeah, I read Christine’s article. I know everyone else jumped on the bandwagon she started because she told me. And also she has a knack for finding stories,” he says. He walks over and pulls the paper from her hand, wincing when he reads the part about Gamora and handing it back looking a little paler. She should have known he’d been abused, people who haven’t been give her looks of pity, not sympathy. “Guess she decided to come out with that herself,” he says.

Nebula takes the paper back and looks down at the section on Gamora.

 _If she was kidnapped, and that’s a big if, the guy who kidnapped her is probably a better parent than Thanos could ever be. I think she ran away_.

*

Tony knows how to deal with bad publicity, he had to learn young, but Peter and Harley are a lot less used to it. Peter got some backlash last year when he came out as trans, but Tony did a lot of heavy lifting to make sure any and all negative comments stayed the hell away from Peter. Including managing to block loads of IP addresses from Twitter and various other social media sites. He still saw some of it, there’s only so much Tony and JARVIS can do, but for the most part he didn’t see much.

Now Thanos has managed to drag up every horrible thing Tony has ever done- which unfortunately amounts to a lot of shit he’s not very proud of, in an attempt to bury him in so much media bullshit he doesn’t know what to do. Most unfortunately for him though Tony is good at outsourcing and JARVIS is almost as good at digging as Christine is and she’s found things that are more unpleasant than Tony’s past and that’s a feat.

Unlike Tony though he’s releasing things slowly, letting each small bit of information out at just the right time and Christine has a knack for finding that time too. Thankfully she agrees that every story has a good and bad time to come out and she’s stuck mostly to his plans. When she’d gone off script though its gone well so he trusts her instinct on that. Plus if he’s honest with himself she’s probably not listening to his schedule anyways, she doesn’t much listen to anything but her gut.

So while Tony is finding this media battle easy, and the legal battle is even easier honestly- he hadn’t anticipated that but cops don’t like Thanos- the kids aren’t. Peter would never say anything even if Tony knows he’s just as angry as Harley, but Harley has been growing increasingly irritated with Nebula, who is now mostly secluded to her room. And, as much as it pains him to do it, someone has to tell the kid to cool it. Its not Nebula’s fault any of this is happening- its Thanos calling the shots here and she’s just the victim of it. So is Tony, and by extension the kids suffer too.

Harley angrily stabs at a strawberry on his pancake- Nebula had grabbed the one with bananas and run off with it before Peter could claim it for his own but Tony makes a note of that- and Peter pushes his pancake around his plate. “Talk, you two,” Tony tells them finally, done with Harley’s passive aggressive food stabbing and Peter’s guilty not eating.

He’s not surprised when Harley talks first. “That Thanos guy is an asshole,” he says and Tony snorts and laughs. That’s an understatement but he lets Harley have it. “Why’s he gotta screw up all our lives? Its not our fault he loves Nebula so much,” he snaps and Tony raises an eyebrow.

“You’d call that love?” he asks, surprised when he’s not sure he should be. Harley doesn’t know the whole story, just that Thanos is doing an awful lot to try and get Nebula back. To him that may very well look like love. Its what it looks like to anyone who doesn’t have the full story, he knows, because that’s what the news has been reporting.

“Well why the hell else is he ruining all our lives to get her back?” he asks.

“Control,” a cool, harsh voice says from the other side of the room and they all look over to find Nebula standing in the doorway with an empty plate in her hands. She looks closed off and more suspicious than she normally does. Tony winces but Harley looks confused.

“Control over  _what_?” he asks.

“Nebula,” Tony tells him. “Its how abusers work- they want to make sure you’re isolated from everyone else around you and right now I’m the only bridge Nebula has so Thanos is doing his damnedest to burn it. If I go away Nebula is alone again. Sucks to be him though, because I’ve been dealing with my ass being publicly flamed since I was six and told the president to fuck off.” It wasn’t his fault Howard dragged him out and kept prodding him awake all night, he was  _six_ , he should have been in bed but no. Then the damn president  _had_  to come over and Tony had had enough and did what he saw all the adults do when someone pestered them- he told the president to fuck off. Looking back on it people were fucking  _vicious_  to a child that had been frustrated and only ever exposed to adult ways of dealing with things, and they weren’t very good adult models at that, so its not like that was  _his_  fault. But it meant he developed a thick skin to this sort of thing early on.

He sees Peter make a realization, Harley looks confused, and to his intense surprise Nebula bounds forward, all but throws her plate on the counter, and then hugs him. Her grip is surprisingly tight for a kid her age but he hugs her back softly. Harley is still frowning but he seems to realize that Peter has realized something so tony figures he’ll let them sort some things out before he comes back to talk to Harley again.

*

Rhodey had been in Afghanistan when he got the news that Tony got himself into some more trouble, big surprise, but he’d almost hopped on a plane to kill this Thanos asshole himself when he accused Tony of  _pedophilia_. He’s lucky he has some good friends and Sam mostly who kept him away from planes for a few days until he cooled off and also Tony managed to take some media control over the narrative surrounding this Nebula kid.

That quickly becomes a battle so he ends up making a small vacation trip home sporting Sam because he didn’t, in his words, trust Rhodey not to commit a murder. That’s probably for the best because Rhodey has Thanos’ home address and he hasn’t spent this long in the military to not know how to get rid of a body. It wasn’t really knowledge he wanted when he got it, the situation had been rather horrific, but now its useful and Sam following him back was probably a good plan, actually.

Tony, has per Tony usual, doesn’t care about the major shit storm surrounding his everything despite Thanos managing to fling accusations at Tony left and right. Tony’s methods of fighting back are slower, the actual  _truth_ , and not nearly as abundant but its starting to add up to enough to make people question Thanos. Namely why is he trying to bury a guy so hard when said guy has no obvious interest in fighting back? Tony’s only comment on all of the shitty accusations that have been tossed his way was that he wasn’t afraid of baseless statements made by men who were too afraid of the truth and shit that ended up being more powerful than Tony knew.

Overnight Rhodey watches people go from somewhat skeptical of Thanos’ almost frantic accusations to sure that Tony, who has done little more than roll his eyes, ignore, or shake his head at this mess, is maybe more innocent than they thought. And that’s when the stories about Thanos that support Tony’s side of things take a real purchase and Christine gets busy right when things go to court.

Given the situation Rhodey didn’t really think that he’d be the one holding Tony back given that Sam has been the one holding him back for the last four months but that’s what happens when Thanos decides to drag Peter into it with what can only amount to transphobia. At the suggestion that Tony is doing little more than indulging Peter’s supposed mental illness Rhodey literally jumps out of his seat, half over the little wall that he doesn’t understand the real purpose for, and grabs Tony by the shoulder before he marches his ass over to Thanos and beats the hell out of him. As it is Tony had already been out of his seat and a step away from his seat before Rhodey caught him because the little bugger moves fast when he wants to.

When Thanos tries to use Tony’s supposedly bad temper against him Christine is, unsurprisingly, the one to point out that if Tony had a bad temper he would have snapped long before that comment about Peter was made. What he was was a pissed off father, and a supportive one at that. Thankfully the public seems to mostly agree with that.

“How the hell does he always get himself into these messes?” Sam asks him after Day Three of shitty court proceedings.

Rhodey sighs, “I don’t know, but its better than the time he almost got kidnapped by terrorists,” he says. Not for Nebula, but for Tony none of this media frenzy is anything new. He can handle it even if he’s not so sure about the kids. Tony isn’t either, but Rhodey knows he’ll talk to them as best he can not that he has too much faith in that. Tony is as good at communication as a moose with a few too many missing brain cells.

*

Tony knows Nebula doesn’t understand why they don’t just drop the abuse thing and that’s partially because timing is everything, and also because Gamora’s statements got too swept under the rug. But Thanos is turning himself into his own worst enemy at this point with all his crazy statements and assumptions and Tony is more than happy to capitalize on that. At this point people are starting to wonder about Thanos’ sanity given his near frantic state a solid one hundred percent of the time and, in comparison, Tony’s relative calm. Its probably the only time he’s ever been accused of being calm, collected, or rational honestly. Most people thought he was nuts until he proved them wrong.

The small shining light in this mess, he supposes, is discovering that Rhodey has found himself in a relationship he hadn’t expected and Sam is lovely. And he also happens to be trained in psychology so Tony had been eternally grateful when he offered to talk to Nebula. He’d like for her to go to therapy of course, but he knows she’ll be as resistant to it as he was. Is. So Sam doing a little legwork to convince her that talking to someone isn’t a bad thing is much appreciated. And Peter will probably throw out his own advocacy too, given his own brief stint in therapy.

The other shining light is that Harley has at least cooled his resentfulness. Tony thought it’d take longer for him to calm down but he eventually comes to the conclusion that Thanos is batshit nuts and not in the diagnosable way and issues an apology to Nebula that she snubs. When Harley had been hurt by that Tony has to have an awkward conversation about what it means to be in her position, to have so many people be either unwilling to listen or unwilling to believe her situation only to have it happen here too. An apology is a good start, but ultimately it feels cheap after being identified as the problem in their lives. He makes sure to tell Harley that if he works at it he’ll gain Nebula’s trust, but that it’ll take some time after accidentally playing into her abuse.

Thankfully he’d taken it well but Tony thinks Peter talked to him too and he’s sure something he said is what stuck, not what Tony had told him.

*

Peter is smart, really smart, and he’s also really tempted to track that Thanos guy down because he really,  _really_  doesn’t like him. Neither does Harley even if it took awhile, longer than Peter but only because Peter saw things he didn’t. He knew there was something familiar about the way Nebula acted, the way she seemed to shrink away from new people, from Harley in particular when she’d been here for awhile. And when Tony told them about the abuse it clicked- its not the same thing, but he reacts the same way after Flash is an asshole to him. Well, he’s stoped that now mostly but before when he’d been determined to make Peter’s life hell.

That’d been how he managed to explain things to Harley, especially when he was annoyed that Nebula didn’t take his apology well. Peter hadn’t taken Flash’s apology well either though, not after all the abuse he put him through. And maybe Harley didn’t actually  _do_  anything to Nebula, but it’d been obvious he didn’t want her here either and where else would she go if she wasn’t here? Back to Thanos probably and that had to hurt to live with someone who wanted that to happen to her because she was an inconvenience. Harley had felt even more bad after Peter explained it that way but he told Harley that Nebula would probably come around. He and Flash are cordial with each other now, sometimes he even helps Flash with his math. And when he started dating Ned instead of being a jerk Flash congratulated him so people can grow and people can forgive. He just needs to work at not being a jerk anymore.

Harley does his best to try and bond with Nebula after that but Peter has an easier time of it when he discovers she likes Star Trek better than Star Wars too but they can’t tell Ned, he’ll die. Harley does manage to bond with her over how much they both hate science though and that hurts both his and Tony’s hearts because science is the best.

*

Christine writes the story before talking to Tony because she’s the expert, not him, and contrary to what me might like to think he’s not in charge, she is. So she runs the story at just the right time, with the perfect interview, and worries about setting Tony up with her source in the morning.

By the time that comes she knows she’s made the right choice because the public has swayed totally in Tony’s favor thanks to Gamora outlining exactly how Thanos abuses. It helps that every single thing she talked about has been in the public eye for months now and Christine easily draws the comparisons for the public, topping it off with the evidence of Nebula’s abuse. The story is probably the most hard hitting thing she’s ever written- she’s used to being handed puff pieces and she’s annoyed about it- but this is sure to put her right where she wants to be career-wise.

Maybe she can finally get to writing about politics like she’s always wanted to instead of writing about Tony fucking Stark not that she doesn’t have a begrudging friendship with him. But she doesn’t want him to be all she ever writes about.

*

Christine is a genius, and Tony doesn’t use the term lightly, because her piece completely changes the tide of public opinion and whether or not people want to admit it public opinion always ends up in the court. It doesn’t always go the way it should, but a good portion of the time the public spin will find its way into the verdict and not only does Tony get his adoption but Thanos is brought up on a stupid amount of charges to boot. He supposes he can also thank Gamora for that, she’s a brave woman not that Nebula had been overly fond to see her.

She’ll come around, Tony is sure, but for now she remains suspicious of her. She does, at least, now get along nicely with Harley and Peter so that’s nice. “Sorry I called yelling at you,” Pepper tells him and Tony frowns because he mostly forgot about that.

“Whatever Pep, shit happens. I mean after all the things I’ve done I don’t blame you for thinking that I finally went off the deep end or something,” he says. Honestly its probably not even the worst thing she’s caught him doing. The woman really needs a raise but she’s the CEO so she makes her own wage now.

“You did good,” she tells him. “I never would have been able to deal with all that.”

He frowns again, “all what?”

Pepper squints, “Tony, the entire  _world_  hated you for months because they thought you were trying to steal a kid from her loving father and they had no idea why the cops weren’t doing anything,” she says.

Yeah, well, the public is fickle. They’ll hate him again next week and like him the week after- that kind of social whiplash is what being a celebrity is whether he likes it or not. Pepper doesn’t seem to think that makes his taking in Nebula any less impressive though and he lets her think that mostly because he knows she won’t be convinced otherwise. What he really cares about is Nebula, and she’s safe, happy. That’s what matters to him, the only thing that matters to him aside from the happiness of his other kids.

So long as they’re okay he doesn’t give two shits what the public thinks of him.

**Author's Note:**

> [My writing Tumblr](https://tenspencerriedplease.tumblr.com/)


End file.
